European Car Sales Fell 12% in August

FRANKFURT—Registrations of new cars in Europe fell for the fifth consecutive month in August, hit by the end of several state-backed scrapping initiatives.

New-car registrations dropped 12% in August from a year earlier to 731,503 vehicles. "Continuing the downward trend shown in the second quarter of 2010, new car registrations ... slipped into considerable percentage drops over the summer months," the European Automobile Manufacturers Association said in a statement Thursday. "In August, as in July,...